Sounds redundant, but if you have ever worked for an automotive group, you've probably actually heard those words. Meetings after meetings. The sad thing about it is the meetings usually involve only management. Walk up to any tech and ask them how many hours they have for the week and they'll tell you up to the minute. Ask them what your gross profit objective is for the month, you'll probably get a blank stare. Usually the first tech meeting I have after coming into a store, I ask "What…

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Those words were actually said to me but I'll get to that in a little bit. 

Well the dog days of summer are upon us. The showrooms are filled to capacity and your next available service appointment is in two weeks! Every marketing piece you've done has been a home run. Your biggest problem is where to park all these customer cars and all the managers can think of is how sweet their commissions are going to be. Some are even thinking that, at this rate, I can retire in a couple of…

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Recently, Chrysler announced that they reached their goal of having 80% of their stores opened on Saturday. In the pre-Fiat days, the number was closer to 60%! How exciting! What are the other 20% of their stores doing being closed? How can you NOT open your service department at all on Saturday? Even if they are there to support the sales department, they need to be open. Unless of course you have a CBA saying you must be closed which, in that case, the person who negotiated the contract,…

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Back in the 1970's, I cut my teeth in the car business pumping gas and being a mechanics (yes we were called mechanics then) helper. I learned quite a bit and it set the foundation for a wonderful career in the automotive industry. 

One of my early lessons in customer service was provided by my old boss. Our oil change cost $9.95. A quart of oil cost about $1.10 back then. The store I worked at was an Exxon franchise. Now our customer could go into the chain supermarket right next…

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The #1 thing that drove me crazy in stores were the phones. I would spend days, weeks, months, planning a marketing strategy to make our phone rings and then I would end up answering most calls myself, setting up appointments, and answering status calls(my least favorite call to get!).

I've watched service advisors look at their ringing phones and NOT answer it. When I saw that, it required, what I called, an immediate training session with the advisor. As like most of you who…

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Service manager needed. Last one quit over pay. Candidate must have proven record of poor CSI and lack leadership ability. Poor selling skills a must.



Did you ever get to the point while reviewing resumes and doing initial interviews, that an ad like the one above was the one you actually posted?



When I began the service drive part of my career at a dealership, the prevailing idea was that you can either sell or be good with customers. I started as one of 11 advisors at a… Continue